What It Takes To Build Healthy Corporate Culture
With WD40 CEO Garry Ridge
Corporate Culture will make or break an organisation.
In 2022 research by MIT Sloan Management Review, 'Toxic Culture' was ten times more likely to cause employees to quit, making it the driving force of The Great Resignation.
The data points to a clear imperative for organisations: Create a good culture, or loose your employees.
According to WD40 CEO Garry Ridge, his first lesson in growing good culture begun in a high school science room learning to cultivate culture in a Petri dish. He says much like growing good culture in a Petri dish, to grow a healthy company culture it's all about what you put in.
"If you want to grow good culture, you've good to put good ingredients in, this stands for company culture, too."
So, what ingredients do we need for healthy company culture?
Garry Ridge and his team of Coaches at WD40 offer a compelling case for focusing on culture, the company boasts extraordinary employee satisfaction with:
Global employee engagement of 93%
98% of employees say they love to tell people where they work
96% saying they respect their coach
Here's the ingredients WD40 have been adding to their Petri dish of Healthy Culture:
1. Compelling Purpose - Connecting all employees to a purpose greater than themselves and ensuring their contributions feel connected to the bigger picture.
2. Core Values - Ensuring expectations around 'how we do things' is clear at all levels.
3. Care & Candour - 'Take care of your people and business will take care if itself' says Garry, with openness and honesty.
4. Clear Accountability - Creating a safe space for employees to take ownership for learning and growing under a 'no mistakes here' policy around error making.
5. Leadership Responsibility & Bravery - Leaders take radical responsibility for bravely addressing cultural issues head on with care, no burying our heads in the sand.
How exactly does corporate culture impact on the bottom line? Since Garry took the helm of WD40 in 1997 as CEO the company has expanded into 176 countries globally, they've grown from a market cap value of $300 million to $2.5 billion US and grown revenue by almost 6 x - all by selling oil in a can.
As Garry quoted in his podcast conversation on We Are Human Leaders
"Aristotle said pleasure in the job puts perfection in the work."
We think he presents a pretty compelling case for a human-first company culture, would you agree?
Listen to our full conversation with Garry Ridge on the We Are Human Leaders podcast now live everywhere you access podcasts. Garry shares further personal insight around his journey as a CEO, highlights the traits of bad managers, and helps us unpack how 'culture eats strategy for breakfast.'
